Scientists hope a giant pumice rock floating in the Pacific Ocean will help restore the Great Barrier Reef (Credit: NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey)

Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, home to over 1,500 fish species and countless other marine animals, is in trouble. Rising ocean temperatures, attributed to climate change, have destroyed about half of its coral since 1998. On August 30, 2019, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority downgraded the ecosystem's condition from "poor" to "very poor" and warned that the window of opportunity to save it was rapidly closing. Now, some scientists are hoping that a gigantic piece of pumice stone currently floating towards Australia will aid in the recovery of the world's largest coral reef system.